Lord Jones of Birmingham, with his newly bestowed title, strode into his first Trade and Industry Committee as Trade Minister to be confronted by the voices of Christmas past.

Around the horseshoe-shaped table of MPs papers fluttered and Lord Jones’s forthright words from his days as director-general of the CBI, and even more forthright ones from the days after he had left that post, came echoing back.

Didn’t you say unions were selfish, politically motivated and irrelevant?

Didn’t union leaders get peerages because of their financial patronage of the Labour Party. Bit of a tricky one that, now. Wasn’t the European Union like an ostrich with its head in the sand? Didn’t you wish there were more Brummie MPs running England because there are too many Scottish ones doing so?

This was the first time that MPs had to see if the robust views of Comrade Digby – so dubbed by the Prime Minister after the unions’ shock at his appointment – had altered since his seven-year tenure of the CBI.

On this outing, it was not immediately obvious. Lord Jones had developed strange parrot-like tendencies and would say only “That was then and this is now” about a dozen times. The new Department of Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform must have clipped his wings. Even Labour MPs, such as Lindsay Hoyle, the member for Chorley, could not provoke a reaction by pressing him to join the party.

The former corporate lawyer would talk only about Gordon Brown being the captain of the team he was proud to be a part of. Is that the same Gordon Brown that loaded business with unfair taxes?

The Tories warmed to their witness better. Peter Bone, MP for Wellingborough, said of his ostrich EU speech: “It’s the first time I have ever agreed with every word a Labour minister has said.”

Call him a doom monger, but Mr Hoyle was concerned that the odd affair between the Government and Lord Jones could hit the buffers. “What happens if it all ends in tears?” he asked. Lord Jones replied: “What if the UK ends in tears?” No, Mr Hoyle clarified, if Lord Jones fell out with the Government, would he hand his peerage back? “Certainly not,” said Lord Jones. There will be more of the baron of Birmingham to come.